


Collision

by silkbow



Series: The Modern Assassins [AU-verse] [4]
Category: Assassin's Creed
Genre: Gen, Modern Assassins, OT5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-07
Updated: 2013-01-07
Packaged: 2017-11-24 02:05:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/629114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silkbow/pseuds/silkbow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Assassins Order has priorities. And sometimes that means leaving a man behind. But it’s not always easy. Not always possible.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“What happened?”

 

“We’re not sure. Our sources have to get back to us. Something about a collision en route to a possible safe house near Berlin.”

 

“How many are accounted for, if not unaccounted?”

 

“No word yet.”

 

“There are at least five spread over two vehicles, and you can’t give me any numbers yet?”

 

“We’re waiting for word. As soon as we know, you’ll know, sir.”

 

“I expect good news.”

 

~*~

 

It’s a surreal process, that of a car crash. You are fine one minute and not the next. Though ‘fine’ is subject to one’s individual definition when being pursued across and back over two lanes of highway by angry, fast driving Templars. But one second you’re looking ahead, to the road stretching out before you and the next everything shifts. Suddenly there’s grass, trees, sky… and you’re off the road.

 

The team was split up in to two halves, in identical white compact vans. Rebecca, Lucy and Desmond were in one while Shaun, Clay and the Animus and its various techs were in the other. It was a smaller highway, and they weren’t even supposed to officially be back on the grid yet. Yet somehow, despite all efforts, they were tracked.

 

And it started out as such a nice day, too.

 

~*~

 

When they headed out it was barely five o’clock in the morning, and the tarps over the vans were wet with dew. Clay and Desmond took up folding them them while Rebecca and Shaun slowly moved equipment into the vans. All the while bickering over lyrics to a popular brit-pop song.

 

Lucy did a great job to hold in her sigh, resting on one elbow on the front of a van. She was plotting their route on the map she had unrolled across the hood, dotting lines in blue ink. The only solid line was the route through the back roads that would take seven or eight hours, many more than the actual highways would.

 

“How long’s it going to be?” Asked Desmond, rolling up the sleeves to his sweater. Tarps folded, he pulled out an apple from the cooler in the van and rolled it across the back of his hand and along his wrist. “The magical number is three, say ‘three hours’.”

 

“Try seven.” Lucy replied without looking up, tapping that blue ballpoint pen against the map. “If we’re lucky.”

 

Desmond groaned, and Rebecca popped her head out of the back of one of the vans. “Are we still avoiding the more trafficked areas?”

 

“For now. It seems like the best choice…” Lucy said, though her words hung in the air with a touch of uncertainty. “To be on the safe side, we really should lay as low as possible.”

 

“Safe side,” repeated Shaun, with a side eye to Desmond and a slight scowl. “Oh look at the show off. Rolling fruit this way and that all up his arm. Oh, caught it with your neck did you. Brilliant devotion of time better spent elsewhere.”

 

“You’re just jealous.” Desmond retorted with a smug grin.

 

“Good for you.” He nodded his head towards Desmond, but cleared his throat. “But the safe side is always the ideal one, bellies deep in the sand and all that.”

 

“Why no main roads? I mean, we’ve been crawling through mud tracks for weeks now. Nobody’s following us.”

 

“We don’t know that.” Lucy replied with her eyes still on the map, flickering back and forth as if still drawing up and considering other routes. “Abstergo is always one step behind us, Desmond.”

 

“Ah, the cheerful thought of the day.” Clay said as he appeared behind Rebecca, leaning over her shoulder with his hand planted on one side of the van’s inner walls.

 

Rebecca fed him a piece of popcorn. “We’re lucky there aren’t any cell towers out here, as it is. And I’m still pulling out every precaution to block out waves.”

 

“But how long with the main roads?” Desmond asked with a nod to Lucy, sinking his teeth into the apple after catching it after a particularly brazen throw overhead.

 

“It’d shave hours off the trip, but… is it worth it.” Lucy said, glancing up. Her eyes scanned the others. “We’d be chancing it. Bad.”

 

Rebecca chewed her lip, giving a shrug. “I’ll follow whatever you do, Luce. I don’t have any preference.”

 

“I’m with Becks on this one,” said Clay. “And so the pack follows the leader.”

 

“Two votes for no vote, beautiful example of voicing one’s opinion…” Shaun strained, stacking books in a crate by Rebecca’s feet. Her scowl downwards was met with a similar upwards glance.

 

Shaun straightened up, adjusting the neck of his sweater. “I personally advise staying as we are, safely off the grid as much as possible. At least until we’re closer to the safe house.”

 

Palms in the air, he shrugged. “Or we go out and get caught, make that wonderful week we used a fancy bucket for a loo really worth it.”

 

“Well, that’s one against. And one for.” Said Desmond. “So, as leader of the pack, you get to break the tie.”

 

Lucy folded her arms over her chest, giving a long glance to the map. “Everyone finish up packing, we’re on the road in fifteen.”


	2. Chapter 2

And on the road they were, Lucy at the wheel of the van containing her, Desmond and Rebecca. She takes lead in their van, guiding Shaun and Clay in the other across the rural roads. At first it’s the route as planned, though somewhere in past an hour they started weaving closer to modern day civilization.

 

Lucy’s eyes were fixed on the road ahead of her, an invisible weight on her from the stress of venturing more out in the open. Her eyes were quick to skirt the vehicles they pass, the roads and ramps on and off the high way.

 

Desmond kept an even watch in the seat to her side, elbow on the interior of the door with his chin resting on his upturned palm. “So we’re heading out of the woods?”

 

“Yes…” She said, drawing out the word through her teeth. “Just keep an eye out for anything suspicious. And Rebecca, tell us when we’re getting too close to the towers.”

 

Curled up in a corner at the back of the van with a knit blanket around her shoulder, Rebecca nods. A laptop is open across her knees and the dim glow of it and other monitoring devices flicker across her face. “Will do.”

 

She tapped her finger tapping on a walkie-talkie by her side. “So far so good, though. I’m not sure what type of variation you’re taking on the route you mapped, but from what I saw it was plotted really good, Luce. And unless they set up another cell tower in the last half year, we shouldn’t run into any unexpected surprises.”

 

“So how long until check in?” Desmond asked, a little wary but the vans weren’t exactly coasting along at any exceptional speed.

 

“We’ll be edging closer to the faster highways in a few hours.” Lucy replied, “Provided everything goes as planned, by noon we should be at our next safe house.” She paused briefly. “In an hour or two we’ll make a stop, but I’m not feeling too comfortable about contacting them right now.”

 

She sighed. “Something feels off when I think about it.”

 

~*~

 

Things started going wrong fairly quickly after that.

 

As soon as they made it on to the highway they were already late, ten am sun heating steel as they found themselves in the midst of gridlock. Somehow a sea of cars had slipped around them, barely moving along.

 

Lucy’s annoyance and irritation was an almost visible force. “I knew it.” She said, shaking her head. Her fist hitting the top of the steering wheel. “I knew I should’ve kept to the old route.”

 

Desmond took a breath, easing out his shoulders in the cramped van. The tension was thick, and there wasn’t too much to say. Nothing would really ease Lucy’s mood, and it’s not like she was the only one affected. There was a lingering feeling of uncertainty amongst the three of them, and likely Clay and Shaun as well.

 

“Hey, hey, Eagle’s Nest to Brit Invasion, over.” Rebecca spoke to her walkie-talkie, laptop set on the floor of the van in front of her.

 

There’s silence, then a crackle. “Beck…”

 

“Did he make a face?” She snorted. “Over.”

 

“And it’s getting worse…” Clay’s voice carried back over. “Over.” He added on after a moment, slightly resigned but his voice edged with slight amusement.

 

“How close are you?” Rebecca asked, scooting to the back window to look out.

 

“Six cars behind, lane to the right.” He replied. “Yeah, I see you.”

 

“Kind of weird, think it was an accident?” Desmond asked, craning his neck to the side. “It’s too far ahead to see anything.”

 

Lucy’s hands tapped restlessly against the wheel. “I don’t know. I know how it sounds, but I really hope it was just… an accident.”

 

“Abstergo?” Desmond eyed her, though he seemed to take the thought and branch it out himself without needing reassurance. “That’d fit… But they don’t know we’re here, they can’t.”

 

“Like I said.” Lucy replied. “I really hope…”

 

~*~

 

By the time they were the two thirds of the way there it was already edging into night fall. Hours spent, wasted, in the middle of traffic. Their pit stop was crowded and miserable, gas tanks needing refilling and taking even more time and light from their hands. Five o’clock seemed to slither like a snake.

 

“I can’t fucking believe it,” Rebecca sighed, stretching out on the floor of the van. “Twelve hours. Ten, if you don’t count the two pit stops.”

 

Lucy’s brow was creased, expression tired. The highway they weaned off to was much less inhabited, but her eyes still flickered back and forth at the slightest notice.

 

“Britpop and Cutie, you still trailing? Over.” She murmured to her walkie-talkie, holding it to her jaw.

 

“We’re still-”

 

“Grow up, Rebecca, please…” Shaun’s voice cut in. “Act like an adult, you are one, yeah?”

 

“…Yeah, we’re still here.”

 

Rebecca rolled over to her belly, crawling to the back of the van again. Twelve hours in a contained space seemed to leave her even more restless than the rest of them, energy spinning but with nowhere to go. She pressed up against the glass with a sigh.

 

“We’re about forty minutes…” Lucy murmured, “Thirty if we gun it, but I don’t like these roads at night.”

 

“Think we’ll have them worried? We’re late, didn’t check in…” Desmond asked, fishing through the cooler for another piece of fruit to eat.

 

“No,” Lucy said softly. “This isn’t that uncommon. Some might even say we’ve made exceptional time… or have encouraged us to split it up even longer.”

 

She paused, eyes flicking up to the rear view mirror. “Rebecca, can you tell me if we’re getting close to the city tower?”

 

Silence.

 

“Rebecca?”

 

“Guys…” Rebecca said with concern lacing her voice, still peering out the back window of the van.

 

“What?”

 

“Guys!” This time she shouted into the walkie-talkie, directing her attention to Clay and Shaun. “Six o’clock, the light’s about fifteen feet behind—it’s getting tighter.”

 

“Shit, what…” Came the response, Shaun and Clay’s van slowly passing lanes, the black SUV behind them following.

 

“Fuck.” Rebecca twisted around, catching Lucy’s backward glance. “We’ve got company, at least one car tailing them.”

 

Lucy’s foot hit the pedal, jerking Rebecca back a step before she righted herself and returned to the van’s back window. Holding the overhead support beam, she kept her eyes out on the road. Desmond sat straighter in his seat, also turning around to try and see out past the windows.

 

“No way they did this on purpose…” He said, in almost disbelief. “Waiting until dark? Making us…” The roadblock suddenly made a lot more sense as less coincidental inconvenience, more deliberate detour and time sink.

 

Lucy’s knuckles gripped the wheel until they turned white. Her voice however, didn’t betray her and remained stern and focused. “Rebecca! How are we?”

 

The two vans were sliding in and out of the few other cars around them, but were persistently chased. Their speed picked up and then so did their pursuers. Lucy’s foot held down the pedal, and soon things outside of the dark road ahead of them were passing in a blur.

 

“Hey… Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey!” Rebecca’s voice picked up frantically after what felt like an hour of hardened silence. “Fucking… damn it, there’s another one!”

 

A second vehicle had slid out from the side of the road and into the chase, quickly influencing Lucy’s quick decision to veer over sharply to take an exit they nearly missed. The road splintered quickly into a smaller paved road into the woods again, their speed sliding tires and bouncing them wildly as traction refused to take hold again. Lucy’s guidance of the car was steady however, and rather than hit the ditch they peeled off in a flurry of dust and dirt.

 

“Dirt road…” Desmond murmured as pavement gave way to worn tracks. He knew the trouble that came with dirt roads and high speeds.

 

“They’re still… I think that turn took care of one of them, I only see two sets of headlights now.” Rebecca’s voice seemed barren of any usual hitch, dull and quiet in an abnormally wrong way.

 

“We’re – ugh, still here.” Clay’s voice crackled. The rattling of things in their van heard; clattering of metal against metal.

“Why the bloody hell did I decide to take the wheel today?” Shaun’s voice was distant but tight. “Should’ve j-”

 

“Shaun?” Rebecca’s voice escalated to panic again. “Clay?”

 

The lack of lights made driving difficult, but it helped headlights stand out. High beams, almost all Rebecca could make out with a squint. They were, up until a second ago, blindingly facing her and their van ahead. But she watched with great confusion as the van behind them shifted. Turned around. Rolled.

 

She dropped the walkie-talkie, much like Clay did before the SUV behind the van he was in rammed them a second time after at least three bullets lodged themselves in the thick reinforced back door of the van. The second hit was successful at driving them off the road. Everything, the white van ahead of them, the dirt road stretching, it all went surreal. Shifting. Upside down, and he found himself slamming into the ceiling of the van once it hit the ditch hard.

 

Desmond hadn’t quite heard the shrillness of Rebecca’s voice the way he heard it just then, following a gasp, her following demands that they stop. She didn’t scream, she yelled, pleading at Lucy to pull over.

 

“They were hit!” She shouted. “We have to go back, stop—Lucy, we have to!”

 

Lucy’s eyes were focused ahead, seconds were all that were ticking by but it felt elongated and stretched. Paused and silent, completely and terribly wrong. “We’re not…” She started, thinking of the rules… priorities…

 

Desmond was priority. The Apple was a priority.

 

Shaun and Clay… they were Assassins. Trained, important, but they knew their jobs. They knew the priorities in the situation. Desmond and Rebecca were the two out of the group who wouldn’t understand the gravity of it, the reasons behind making a decision like they’d have to.

 

So the rule was not to stop in conflict. To keep going.

 

Get out of the line of fire, shake your tails and keep going.

 

Yet, there was tightness in her throat. Rebecca was on the verge of screaming at her now. And Desmond was speaking but none of the words were coming to her ears right, because Lucy was thinking. She was always good at thinking, making the rational choices. The right choices…

 

Was this…?

 

“Oh. Fuck it.” She said, giving the wheel a sharp turn and stamping on the breaks. They skidded around quickly, the whole van rocking with the sudden motion.

 

Rebecca stopped yelling, tripping over wires and bounding closer to the front seats. Desmond’s eyes were wider, but he was already unclasping his belt and sitting forward in his seat, bracing himself against the door.

 

“Glove box.” Lucy said as they went full speed back towards the SUV, its three occupants already out and blending in to the night with the exception of glow sticks on their belts identifying at least two.

 

Desmond opened it, but Rebecca was already crawling over his lap to reach for the hand gun inside. Lucy grabbed the blunt tipped collapsible pole from the side of her seat, releasing the wheel in the same motion and throwing open her door. Desmond did the same with his, the two of them shrinking for cover behind them quickly when a cascade of bullets shot out from the darkness.


	3. Chapter 3

Pain doesn’t register at first, not the way you normally feel pain. There’s no actual hurt, no feeling, but he knows he hurts even with it failing to register. So Clay blinks, thankful perhaps, because adrenaline may be the only thing keeping him conscious right now. He takes a breath while seconds still feel like minutes, staring at the floor of the van above him before sound returns. And he snaps out of a daze.

Everything is upside down. The Animus is in two parts, one of which is pinning his left leg down. He moves to reach for it but gasps in pain, his left shoulder’s also dislocated. So he kicks at the Animus with his free leg, claws it away with his good hand and wrenches himself forward. His ears still ring but they don’t have time to sit here in the wreck. Not when it smells like gasoline and Abstergo’s thirty seconds away from the door.

“Fuck,” he wheezes, managing to get himself upright and towards the front end of the van. “Shaun?”

The silence scares him, but the groan soon relieves him.

“Fucking hell.” Shaun’s seatbelt keeps him in place, hunched over the steering wheel as if still upright, though his knuckles are white from clutching it. His head pressed to the backs of his forearm muffles his voice, words murmured against the red stained sleeve of his sweater. “Bloody fucking hell. They ran us off the damn road.”

He doesn’t have long to rest and he knows this, pushing back with one hand and unclasping his belt with the other. He braces for the fall that follows, arm up but wincing when he hits the ceiling and rights himself. He tries the door just because he’s near it, but it’s jammed. He turns towards Clay who’s opening up the storage space between the front seats to catch the handgun as it falls out.

“I thought there were two,” Clay says, but hands it to Shaun. He gives his wrist a flick and he’s armed with his hidden blade, for what little good it’ll do a one armed man.

“There should’ve been.” Shaun says with a frown, shifting over to the passenger side and looking out through the glass. In the fog of the night he sees the approaching glow from the belts of Abstergo agents working their way down the small incline from the road. They must’ve skidded far down into the ditch. “How’s your arm?”

“Don’t know.” Clay replies, tentatively touching it. “Sort it out later, right now we need to get out of here.”

The glass is cool against Shaun’s forehead, which is bleeding he notices after leaving a streak of blood on the glass. There’s not enough time to think, he can’t grasp at his thoughts. He’s not sure if it’s the shock and panic or a plausible concussion. “Well we’ve got about a minute and a half and only two options.”

Clay paws through a scattered array of discs that are by his feet. It’s too dark to pick out anything they should take with them. “I vote bolt, playing dead won’t work well if this thing lights up.”

Shaun parts his lips to speak; fingers curled around the door handle but the approaching glow from the Abstergo agents sharply moves and disappear from view. Gunshots ring out from one side of the van and that’s all they need as warning, Shaun wrenching the door open. He stumbles out with gun in hand, turning back to grab Clay’s good wrist and help yank him free from the wreckage as well.

“Those morons.” Is all Clay can mutter with a weak laugh, bracing against the van.

Neither of them know how they feel about this, relief is obvious but at the same time it was an undeniably stupid move. At least from William’s perspective, they’re sure.

“You know how to shoot that, right?” Clay can’t help one playful jib as he massages his ribs, sliding along the side of the van up towards the incline. The look Shaun gives him back is priceless, worth the pain from laughing.

“Come here, you idiot.” Shaun shifts forwards and unremorsefully yanks Clay against him, sliding his arm under his dislocated one with a little more care. He supports his weight as they walk up towards the incline, straying to the darkened sides by the bush.

“Easy, man.” Clay’s teeth are clenched, he’s growingly aware of how his ankle feels screwed as well.

Gunshots continue, but not in rapid succession.

Two figures appear before the bright shining of headlights, bleary streams of color that Clay and Shaun squint at. Shaun’s already got the gun up, and fires instinctively. One shot knocks back one man, but because of his Kevlar vest it only winds him. Shaun fires twice more and he falls, but the second agent raises a much larger gun to retaliate. But he hits the dirt face first.

And looking up to the road, Lucy looks real good with a rifle in her hand. They both have to admit.

“Shaun?” She breathes, skidding down the ditch. “Clay! You’re both alright?”

“Seems that way.” Clay turns back to the van behind him, noting the scent of smoke in the breeze. “Shit, it’s going to go up.”

“Rebecca! Desmond, come and help Clay up to the van.” Lucy yells back over her shoulder, reaching out for his good side. “Shaun, you let go. You’re bleeding pretty bad.”

“Jesus, Shaun…” Rebecca’s reaching up to cup his jaw, grabbing his forearm. “You lean on me. Des can help Lucy with Clay.”

“Weren’t there more of them?” Desmond asks, white sweater smeared with dirt and a good splattering of someone else’s blood.

He steps up to Clay and braces his other side, though Rebecca and Shaun start up first. “I swear there was…”

They all wince when the glass of the van shatters, flames beginning to engulf it. Desmond shields his eyes, looking back in time to see a figure dart off into the woods. “Fuck, there was!”

Shaun collapses to sit on the dirt road but Rebecca turns quickly, raising her gun and firing the last three rounds in her clip in the fleeting figure’s direction. Lucy and Desmond are supporting Clay’s weight, though Desmond makes a move to start after him before Lucy shakes her head.

“It’s not worth it.” She grunts, rifle slung over her free shoulder as they heave Clay up the muddy incline. She reaches out to grab Rebecca’s hand to help hoist them up when their boots slide. “It’s too dark and too dangerous. We need to regroup, get out of here and get Clay and Shaun taken care of.”

“One Abstergo agent on foot’s not going to go far.” Rebecca says, glancing back at the abandoned vehicles the agents came in. “He’ll probably circle back, so we should total his ride.”

The ground’s covered in downed individuals, some bloodier than others. Desmond nudges one out of the way with his sneaker to help Clay to their van before opening the sliding door. They help him to sit against the edge of the floor, and he braces with one hand on the back of a seat. Lucy help’s Shaun into the passenger seat after some deliberation, considering him fit enough for it. Rebecca opts for the back to help watch over Clay, and Desmond takes to the task of slicing all eight wheels of the SUVs that ruined their happy little trip.

“We gotta go, now.” Rebecca says, sticking a pillow under Clay’s head after helping him lay back in the bed of the van. She’s pulled out their bundle of blankets as well, padding a support under his arm while trying not to move it too much. “Those vehicles will have trackers and probably dash cams too. Since they won’t be checking back in, they’ll know something’s up. It’s not safe.”

Desmond shifts in, settling down on the other side of Clay after shutting the door. Lucy revs the engine.

“You look like shit.” He says, and Clay laughs.

“Thanks for the compliment, real flattering.” He coughs, “I’ll remember that. My arm’s only dislocated, you know? I can still beat your ass with the other one.”

Desmond grins, pushing down his hood and getting comfortable. Rebecca seems to be doing the same, and after some shuffling and uneasy looks through the back windows of the van, she seems to relax. Clay’s head ends up in her lap after she steps around him, tucked in against Desmond’s side.

Desmond ends up shirtless beneath his hoodie when Shaun needs something to compress his forehead with, and Lucy’s eyes stare forward on the road with a dull sort of stare. And a weary, odd quiet slowly takes over the van. They ride in silence the rest of the way to the safehouse.


End file.
